General European Conference
By L. R. Conradi
ON Thursday evening Elder L. R. Conradi, the president of the General European Conference, presented his report to the delegates as follows:— As we consider the past, God’s wonderful providence over his work stands out the brightest. Europe, as well as North America, had its 1844 movement, but the seed sown slumbered for many years before men felt called upon to water, foster, and reap it in the last and final movement—the third angel’s message. Throughout Europe we find even to-day some aged members, who, with joy, testify to their 1844 experience, and one family in southern Germany even date their first observance of the Sabbath of Jehovah back to that time. As early as 1860 a number of sincere believers near the beautiful Rhine valley were led out independently of any human agency to observe the true rest day. But not until 1864 did some one feel impressed to leave the United States, of his own accord, and plant the Sabbath truth in French-Switzerland. He tried to hide its true connection, but it gradually became known that there was a distinct, well-organized body of believers in North America who taught and lived out the truths presented. This caused the few believers in Switzerland to send Elder J. Erzenberger as a delegate as early as 1869, but he arrived too late for that General Conference. It was not until 1874 that our first missionary, Elder J. N. Andrews, was sent from the States. Thus the great European field was our first mission field, and the result reaped since justifies in every way the wisdom of that move. The first general meeting of the few believers in Switzerland was held in November 1874. In January, 1875, at a still larger gathering, it was decided that Elders Andrews and Erzenberger should visit the Sabbath-keepers in Rhenish Prussia. It was in 1875 that we first began to print in this field, three French tracts. At the conference held that fall, there were seventy-five Sabbath-keepers in French-Switzerland, and these, with the fifty in Germany, made a total of one hundred and twenty-five. In January, 1876, the first believers were baptized in Germany. July of that year saw the beginning of our first European paper, printed in French. In 1877 Elder Matteson responded to a call from Scandinavia, some two hundred dollars being sent without solicitation on our part, for his travelling expenses. June 6 he began his work in Denmark, where he found some already keeping the Sabbath, as the result of reading publications furnished by some Scandinavian brethren in America. In 1878 Brother Ribton began work in Italy, and Brother Matteson went to Norway, and Brother Ings and his wife first visited England, and, on account of his appeals, the General Conference sent Elder J. N. Loughborough that year to take charge of the work there. In January, 1879, our first Scandinavian paper appeared in Christiania, and in February of that year our first building association in Europe was formed. In 1880 the first small conference, the Danish Conference, was organized, and the first number of any of our European health papers appeared at Christiania, and, further, the work was begun in Sweden. The first baptism also took place in England that year, on February 8. It was in 1881 that the countries of Europe were first visited by a representative of the General Conference, Elder Haskell. In connection with his visit was the first general council meeting held in Europe, at which delegates from Scandinavia, England, and Switzerland were present. In 1882 a conference was organized in Sweden; a British supplement to the Signs was published, which was supplanted by Present Truth the following year. The statistics of 1882 show that there were, in Scandinavia, 338 members, with seven evangelical workers, and a tithe of $534; in Great Britain, two ministers, two churches, with sixty members, and $379 in tithe; in Central Europe, two ministers, sixteen churches, 223 members, with a tithe of $442; or, in all Europe there were 621 members, with a tithe of $1,356, while in the entire world there were only 17,169 believers, with $84,261 tithe,—a little more than we received in Europe last year,—and the total increase that year, throughout the world, was 253 members, or about as many as are now received in some of the small local German Conferences. In 1883 the publication of the German Herold der Wahrheit began in Basel. In 1884 the president of the General Conference, Elder G. I. Butler, visited Europe, and attended the second General European council, held at Basel, beginning May 28, and assisted in organizing the Swiss Conference, and, in harmony with the decision taken at that meeting, the site for the Basel house was purchased, for six thousand dollars. At that gathering, nine different nationalities were represented. It was decided that year, to erect the Christiania publishing house, and the canvassing work in Scandinavia was begun, one laborer in Norway reporting his earnings for January as ten dollars, while in February he had earned only half that sum, as he had been three weeks on a journey. Aug. 19, 1885, Sister White arrived in Europe; in September following, the third European council was held, at Basel. In 1886 the membership of the European field had reached one thousand; six hundred of these were in Scandinavia, three hundred in Switzerland, and the other hundred in Great Britain. It required seventeen years after the visit of Brother Erzenberger to America for us to secure the first thousand members in Europe, while seventeen years later it had reached ten thousand. In 1886 the speaker organized our first church in Russia. In 1887 there was a general meeting held at Moos, Norway, where the Norwegian Conference was organized. Sister White was present at this meeting. In 1888 we find that not less than thirty-six thousand dollars was appropriated for the work in Europe,—mostly for building enterprises. Central Europe received fourteen thousand dollars; Scandinavia, twelve thousand dollars; Great Britain, ten thousand dollars. In 1889 the work was permanently taken in hand in the German empire. We opened our mission at Hamburg that year. In 1891 the membership of the General26European field had reached 2,263. There was a division in the Central European Conference, and Germany reported 111 members, with $752 tithe; and Russia had 308 members, with $370 tithe; Great Britain then had 199 members, with a tithe of $2,700; and Scandinavia had 1,132 members, with $3,780 tithe. In 1893 our mission property in Hamburg was purchased. In 1895 the German publishing work was moved to Hamburg. In 1898 the first German Conference was organized. It embraced all the territory now in the German Union, save Russia. Its membership was 1,422, and tithe $9,880. About the same time the European Union was organized, with a membership of 6,000, and a tithe of $38,000. In 1901 the General European Conference was organized at Friedensau, with a membership of 7,000, and a tithe of $48,600. The German-Swiss, the South Russian, and the German Union Conferences were organized the same year, and also the Scandinavian Union Council. The year following saw the organization of the British Union, the South England, and the North England Conferences. In 1902 we held the second session of the General European Conference, at London. It was attended by Elder Daniels, and a number of other American delegates. The third session of this conference was held at Friedensau, last summer. Present Status of the Work
During 1903 and 1904 our tithe in the territory of the General European Conference was $146,274, or $38,600 more than during the two previous years; we had 4,057 additions, or a net increase of 2,754, 1,562 more than our net increase for the years 1901 and 1902. We now have 285 evangelical laborers in our field, or ninety-eight more than at the close of the previous biennial term. The gifts, such as Sabbath-school donations, First-day offerings, annual offerings, etc., amounted to $24,324; the book sales to $235,371. The missions we have opened during this time are as follows: Flemish Belgium, Trans-Caucasus, and German East Africa, in the German Union; and Spain and Portugal in the Latin Union. The Rhenish and Prussian Conferences have been organized during this time; and the Scandinavian Union Council changed to a Scandinavian Union Conference. To-day the territory of the General European Conference includes all Europe, Siberia, Northern Africa, Western Asia, an area of eight and a quarter millions of square miles, with a population of 490,000,000,—one third of the inhabitants on the face of the earth. We have three union conferences,—the German, the British, and the Scandinavian Union Conferences,—and two union mission fields,—the Latin and the Oriental Union Missions. We have thirteen conferences and twenty local missions, in which we are actively engaged in spreading the message. Of local conferences we have the following: The East German, the German-Swiss, the Prussian, the Rhenish, the South German, the West German, the South Russian, the North England, the South England, the Danish, the Norwegian, the Swedish, and the Roman-Swiss; of missions, the Austrian, the Balkan, the German East African, the Holland and Flemish Belgium, the Hungarian, the Middle Russian, the North Russian, the Trans-Caucasian, the Irish, the Scotch, the Welsh, the Finnish, the Icelandic, the French, the French-Belgium, the Italian, the Portuguese, the Spanish, the Egyptian, the Syrian, and the Turkish. We publish in English, Welsh, German, Dutch, Danish-Norwegian, Icelandic, Swedish, Finnish, Esthonian, Letonian, Livonian, Slavic, Russian, Polish, Bohemian, Hungarian, Servian, Bulgarian, Roumanian, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Grecian, Armenian, Turkish, and Arabian—twenty-seven languages in all. Since the General Conference two years ago, it has been my privilege to visit German East Africa, where I spent about three months with our workers on the field; and to make a short stay in Spain and Portugal, where one week was spent with our workers (March 14–21, 1905). I have revisited Russia and Finland, attending their meetings in the autumn of 1903; and also made a second trip to Egypt and Palestine, and revisited Turkey, the Balkan States, Austria-Hungaria, France, Switzerland, Scandinavia, and Great Britain,—some of these fields several times,—aside from doing a large amount of work in connection with our local meetings in the German Union and in the Latin Union, the presidency of which was again turned over to me, on the departure of Elder Wilkinson for the States. There have been advanced steps taken in all departments of the work during the last two years. One of the most important moves we have been called upon to make, was the transfer of the sanitarium and food factory from Basel, to Gland, on Lake Geneva. Doubtless most of you have read something of the beginning of our work there. We held our French school last winter at Gland. The sanitarium and the food factory open this summer. Our Latin Union publishing work has been transferred from Basel to Geneva, in a French-speaking territory at the very border of France. We have also begun the erection of a health institution in Constantinople, where Dr. George has been laboring since the fall of 1903, and he has successfully passed the Turkish examinations in French, so that he has full rights as a physician in that country. We have added to our Friedensau plant, the dormitory for young men, the chapel, underneath which are commodious schoolrooms, a new air-bath, and now are erecting a new steam laundry. We have also installed electric lighting. In Denmark, the old Fredrikshavn high-school building, which had been used as a branch of the Skodsborg Sanatorium, has been purchased by the Danish Conference, lately, and will be operated under this management from now on. The financial standing of our publishing work in Finland and in all Scandinavia has greatly improved of late. In Great Britain we have opened the sanitarium work at Caterham and Leicester and Belfast. We are now doing our best to secure a place where we may have our own quarters for school, publishing house, and food factory. I do not often refer to difficulties, and yet that my fellow workers who are having a hard time in other lands, may know that our fields are also beset with difficulty, it may not be amiss to refer to some of the things with which we have to contend. We do not feel to set ourselves up against the government nor the laws in any country, for we believe that nowhere are the laws much more unfavorable to the advancement of the third angel’s message than were the laws of the Roman empire to the progress of the gospel in the first few centuries of the Christian era. Even at that time, and under those laws, the wise apostle wrote: “Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work.” Titus 3:1. But do the best we may, some of the laws are such that they give us trouble. In Turkey, for example, we are not recognized as Protestants, for some of our former Protestant friends would not grant us that favor. As a result, five of our brethren are in prison at Ourfa, where they have been waiting for their verdict for months. Only recognized sects are allowed to preach their faith in Turkey. In one kingdom of southern Germany, our people are fined fifteen dollars a member for attending meeting. They dare not have the Lord’s supper, nor even meet peaceably for any sort of worship. In Russia, as all our brethren will remember, we have had much difficulty with the Russian censorship, and also with the persecution from those opposed to the message. Throughout Germany, we are constantly liable to trouble in our colporteur work; for it is in the power of any German citizen to take exceptions to anything he may find in any of our books or papers, and make complaint to the authorities, and the local authorities notify the central government, and if no protest is made within two weeks, the book or paper may be forbidden in all Germany. Our enemies frequently make use of this law to cause us annoyance. There is also the trouble with the military and the school laws in many parts of Europe,—these are real troubles, and not merely possibilities. But in the midst of all these disadvantageous circumstances, God finds people who hear his voice, and who obey—people who are as true and as loyal as can be found in any place on the face of the earth. They go through hardships for Christ. They deny themselves for him, and they take great joy in his service. They give of their hard-earned means for the proclamation of the gospel. They pay an honest tithe, averaging $7.31 a member. Our organized conferences, so far as possible, pay two tithes of the conference tithe, for missionary work, and give the whole of their Sabbath-school, First-day, and annual offerings to be used in their mission fields. We need the right kind of men, and we need money. However, we feel that with us the greater need is for men who are fitted by nature, education, and the endowment of the Spirit, to act as well-disciplined leaders in the field of active hostilities against the enemy. We have no place for the worker who can not be successful where he is, in the home field. The men who volunteer ought to be well seasoned, so that they can stand the strain which will surely come to them.27They should be men of education and natural ability; but most of all, they ought to be thoroughly converted, and able to teach others the way of salvation. We ask your careful co-operation and prayer in the consideration of the needs of our field, and hope that ere the conference closes, God’s mind may be revealed with reference to who shall help us, and what we can do to help other parts of the field. L. R. CONRADI,
President.